"Bleed."

AUTHOR: Mystic25

SUMMARY: Harry is wounded, not by magic, but by a means that could kill him unless something drastic is done. HHr.

RATING: PG 13 for imagery and language.

A/N: First off, sorry for the corny summary. It was the only thing I could come up with. And secondly, thank you to the reviewers of my first Harry Potter story. Your encouragement is allowing me to hash out something that's been niggling at me for a while now.

A/N: #2: I want to try my hand at a longer HP fic, which I will hopefully be able to pull off. Also I have been a fan of Harry/Hermione for as long as I can remember, but as anyone who has read my other stuff will tell you I can't just write smut, and so this ditty was born…and this ditty is an AU world okay? So no correcting me on certain facts, I knew what I was doing.

DISCLAIMER: Harry Potter and all characters associated with are the property of J.K. Rowling, I will not be making any money off of this. I'm poor, I get it, rub it in my face.

XXXXXXX

LONDON, ENGLAND

11:30 PM

The back alleyway was obscured from all the important buildings that were around it. It was quiet – or as quiet as a city could be. There were sounds of drunken laughter from weather worn men in rags who laughed while drinking cheap scotch.

One of these men – with a beard that almost covered his entire face – tilted the bottle of scotch to his lips, but growled angrily in his throat when nothing fell into his mouth.

"Cheap bastard," he wiped his whiskers as he complained, to no one, because no one was around except a few rats that scurried across empty storage crates. "Scotch isn't what it used to be-" his self heard rant was cut off when an echoing sound that broke into the night, followed by a very high-pitched scream.

A woman's scream echoing out in the night was a bad enough thing on it's own, but it was the noise that had preceded the scream that raised the man's hair even more – it was the sound of a gun firing.

The scotch bottle in his hand shattered as he ran from the shelter that the alley provided. When there were guns involved it was best not to be in the same vicinity; the questioning of police officers could be brutal on a man who slept inside a box each night.

xxxxxxx

The scream – loud as it was from the vantage point of the homeless man – was much louder from its point of origin. So much so that the dark figure nearly dropped the gleaming .9mm Smith and Wesson he was holding. He had dealt with weapons before, but this heavy Muggle creation was new to him. It had nowhere near the smooth flow and quickness of his own willow wand, and it was insanely loud. But despite all of its flaws he knew that it had accomplished it's purpose by the scream of the Mudblood as the foolish boy thrown her to the ground.

He had been expecting such a brazen idiotic act of heroics from the boy, a weakness he was known for. The other boy, the one with the red hair now had his wand raised at him, and a false look of alarm coming across his face. He did not resemble his true self – dressed in the ridiculous canvas trousers and button down top of the gun shop owner he had killed for the weapon he had just fired – and he had to pretend or risk exposing himself.

"Ron!" The Mudblood girl screamed the carrot headed boy's name, but he didn't lower his wand. However his attention was slanted slightly away from him now, so he took this opportunity to escape. He turned and ran from the small open square; keeping his identity cloaked as he fled on foot like a Muggle. He heard the cries of other real Muggles as they came across the scene of his handiwork. Disorder was a weapon in itself. He ducked behind a large dumpster, pulling out his willow wand from the pocket of the pants he was wearing. He waved it quickly and Disaparated without a sound.

XXXXXXXX

Hermione's scream had nearly deafened her as she watched the bullet hit Harry. He seemed to fall in slow motion, smacking the concrete so hard that it sounded like all his bones had shattered.

Her arms and legs stung with road rash from the force that she had hit the ground with when Harry knocked into her. It had been for her, the shot had been intended for her, this was all because of her. It was her idea to come to London to try and find a rare book of spells in the Ministry of Magic Archives. She had searched for hours and hadn't found her book; it had been lost ten years ago. It was very late by the time they had emerged from the Archive Building. They were going to Disaparate back to Ron's home when they came across him:

/"What's a pretty little thing like you doing wandering around here at night?" The leer behind the man's eyes was nauseating, like he was raping her again and again in his head for practice before attempting it for real.

"You're going to have to give me my present if you want to keep going." the sound of a gun cocking tripled Hermione's heartbeat as she stared at the muzzle of the silver. The shot was fired at the same moment a thudding force knocked her forwards. She was instantly winded, trying to force air that wasn't there back into her lungs when she saw-/

"Harry!" Hermonie scrambled to her feet, vaguely feeling Ron grabbing her arm to help her. She fell to her knees beside Harry, ignoring all the pain that came from landing on the already raw flesh. "Harry!" The bullet had torn through the right side of Harry's chest, and blood was pulsating out with the beating of his heart.

"Oh god." Hermonie placed both hands on top of the wound, pressing down tightly. Her contact made Harry scream, but she didn't stop.

"Harry!" Ron stood above them, his wand still out, sweeping it across the group of onlookers that had started to crowd the area. He turned frantically back to Harry, seeing the blood leaking out from Hermonie's hands. "What the bloody hell happened?"

"He's been shot Ron!" Hermonie almost sounded like mother stating the obvious to a child with slightly dull perceptions, but her words were much more terrifying.

"Shot?" Ron tried to wrap his head around the word. The Wizarding world had many terrifying weapons thanks to Voldemort, but not one that could be easily compared to a gun.

"Don't explain it to him," Harry's whisper to her was gritty. There was no trace of humor in his voice. He didn't want to terrify his best friend by explaining the methodology of guns.

"Don't talk!" Hermonie couldn't be protected from the reality. She had grown up with Muggles just like Harry had; she knew full well what guns were capable of.

"Ron put that away!" She hissed. She swept her eyes across the gathering crowd of people that had pooled onto the street because of what had happened. No one had noticed Ron's outstretched wand yet, but they couldn't take any chances.

Ron finally heeded Hermonie's warning and tucked the wand inside the pocket of his zip up wool jacket just as a middle-aged woman pushed her way through the crowd.

"Oh god, the boy!" Her cries were no one specific, and to everyone around her. But she didn't make a move to help; the glaring scene of a boy lying gunned down in the middle of the road had cemented her to the sidewalk, casting a magicless spell that routed in stunned terror.

"What'll we do?" Ron looked from Hermonie to Harry, hoping that one of them had a solution. Ron wasn't a stupid person, but this was an entirely new situation to him. "We need to get him out of here, take him to St Mugos-"

"No!" Hermonie's words were an insistent demand. "Gunshot wounds can't be healed by magic!" She watched Ron's eyes rise in fear and curiosity as to how she was sure of that fact, but there wasn't enough time to tell him. "He has to be taken to a Muggle Hospital-" She raised her eyes and scanned them frantically over the crowd again. "That man, he was a Death Eater – he knew this would happen-"

"A Death Eater?" Ron said in alarm, hearing something that he knew about, but wished that he didn't.

"Out here in public, in London?"

"Shut up Ron!" Hermonie's retort stung, she could tell by the shock in Ron's eyes, but her emotions were too wired to take it back. "It's true, I know it okay?" Her eyes softened just slightly, hoping it was enough of an apology to him.

"But why would he use a gun?" These words were forced out of Harry's mouth on a wheezing breath. He was incredibly dizzy and the pulsating pain in his chest felt like a giant hand was crushing him. "I don't understand I-" his words stalled out on a gasp, blood leaked out of his mouth that he choked on. The pain was blinding him, he gasped for air that wasn't there.

"Harry?" Hermonie watched terrified as Harry's eyes rolled back in his head and he went limp. "Harry!" Hermonie dropped her ear next to Harry's nose, listening. "Ron, he's not breathing!"

Ron was now on his knees beside Hermonie. "If he's going to a bloody Muggle Hospital it needs to be now- what are you doing?" Ron stared at Hermonie in bewilderment as he watched her press her mouth against Harry's. "This isn't the time for kissing-"

"Press your hands against the wound!" Hermonie ordered, ignoring Ron's remark. She had learned life saving skills her last year of primary school before she had entered Hogwarts. It was seven years ago, and she had frantically tried to recall what she had been taught. She pinched Harry's nose and breathed two times into his mouth, nothing happened. She tried again, more desperate this time.

"Damnit Harry, she's a beautiful woman, give her something!" Ron had no idea what she was doing, but he could tell she was trying to save him. His words seemed out of place for what was going on, but it showed that he was trying to keep from losing it.

Had they been safe inside anywhere Hermonie would've given Ron's humor the laughter it deserved, but her only response here was to breathe again into Harry's mouth, and this time he choked again, spewing blood back into her mouth before she could pull away.

"Harry?" Hermonie spat out the blood, placing her fingers under his nose, feeling a faint flow of air.

"Is he-"

"He's breathing," Hermonie's words cut off Ron's. She raised her head seeing Ron's hands pressing down against Harry's chest, blood soaking the cotton of his shirt. She looked around the crowd that had grown ten times in size, looking over the tops of people's heads for the flashes of color of rescue vehicle sirens. She could hear the wail of a siren, but it seemed extremely far off, and she wasn't a doctor, but she knew that Harry was running out of time.

She turned back to Ron, "We have to go now,"

Ron caught the meaning behind her words, but bewilderment came over his face, and he hissed back at her in a whisper: "Hermonie Muggles are everywhere. They'd see us!"

"I don't care!" Hermonie snapped back in a whispered but passionate voice. "I don't care if the Ministry has to spend the next year cleaning it up and I end up in Azkaban for the rest of my life! I'm not going to just sit here and watch Harry die!"

Her eyes were burning and the fire traveled out of her and through the night to Ron. They had been friends since childhood; they had broken countless Wizarding rules to help each other. Ron couldn't watch Harry die under his eyes when he could've done something to stop it any more then Hermonie could. And her complete lack of the rules of Wizardry showed Ron how dire the situation was.

"Set off a diversion, as soon as its cast we'll each grab a hold of Harry and Disaparate okay?"

Hermonie nodded in agreement at Ron. "We'll go to St. Mary's it's the closet hospital from here." In all her haste to get Harry out she made sure to tell Ron where they were going. If she and Ron had different destinations planned, when they Disaparated they could rip Harry apart pulling him in two different directions.

"Ready?" Hermonie whispered.

"Go!" Ron whispered back urgently, releasing one of his hands from Harry's chest and pulled out his wand.

Hermonie's wand was tucked on the inside pocket of her khaki overcoat and she almost ripped the pocket out when she reached for it. She quietly said an incantation, waving the wand just enough to get the spell cast so as to remain as inconspicuous as possible. Her spell shot out silently across the night, emitting a loud clanging shatter thirty yards away that was accompanied by a thunderous popping explosion of firecrackers that lit up the night sky brighter then any New Year's celebration.

There were screams from some of the older people in the crowd, while the younger ones simply turned in stunned confusion at the commotion the fireworks in the air.

"Now!" Hermonie and Ron's grabbed hands and seized Harry's shoulders with their free ones, and with a loud crack all three vanished under the still continuous hale of popping firecrackers.

xxxxxxxxx

Harry felt like he was falling down an endless tunnel, there were voices screaming at him, familiar ones, some distant, some closer. His mother seemed to be talking to him from far off. His father and Sirius calling to him too – saying words that he couldn't make out.

A jolt jarred the voices from his head, and the blackness of the tunnel faded along with all other feeling.

xxxxxxxxx

"What do you have?"

The Emergency Center nurse ran along size the gurney, keeping pace while she answered the doctor's question.

"17 year old male, bullet wound to the right chest, didn't go completely through. Weak respirations-" she cut off when she bumped into the girl that was walking along side him. She was covered in blood, along with the red headed boy who was with her. The pair had emerged with the unconscious boy held between them just inside the hospital entrance, bursting through so bizarrely that several people in the waiting area had screamed.

Hermonie and Ron had Aparated just inside the entrance of St. Mary's behind a large white support column. They had been hidden enough, but when they emerged the sight of their blood-soaked clothes had frightened one young woman with her child and she clutched the boy to her and screamed, making the receptionist behind the desk rush out to see what was going on.

"Miss, Miss!" The nurse had to call twice in order to rouse Hermonie's attention. "What's his name?"

"Harry," Hermonie realized too late that she had given out his real name. But she couldn't take it back, that would make her look insane, she could only do damage control. "Harry Pearsons."

"Are you his wife?"

"Yes," Hermonie answered incredibly quickly, ignoring the look Ron was giving her. Even though Muggle society still dictated Harry to be an adolescent, being married at 17 wasn't an illegal act. But the real reason Hermonie had agreed to this lie was because the Death Eaters weren't looking for a Mr. Harry Pearsons who came into a Muggle hospital with his wife.

The gurney was pushed though into an emergency trauma room crowded with doctors and even more nurses.

"What's his pressure?" The doctor who had met them at the entrance of the hospital asked.

"He's tachycardic," the nurse responded. "He's lost almost a liter of blood."

"Hang O negative on a rapid infuser until he can be typed," the doctor ordered. He cut apart Harry's shirt, and a spray of blood leaked out from his chest. "He's oozing everywhere, looks like the bullet nicked his lung. Ring surgery, tell them to be ready."

Amidst all the commotion of the Emergency team trying to save Harry's life, Hermonie's eyes traveled back and forth, trying to keep up with all the fast paced movement.

"Damnit!" another emergency doctor cursed when he removed the cloth gauze that the nurse had place atop the wound, blood shot out like a fountain. "We've got a bleeder!" The alarm from the EKG machine cried out a second later. "His heart rate's plummeting, get an ambue bag on him, we need to keep heart alive or surgery's not going to do a bloody thing!"

"Harry!" Hermonie's heart almost cracked out of her ribcage. Her scream echoed around the room, echoed just like it had done at the sound of the gun going off.

"Miss you need to wait outside!" the doctor snapped. "Get her out of here!"

One of the nurses quickly hung a bag of saline on an IV pole then hurried over to Hermonie and Ron. "You have to go, please, the doctors have to work." The nurse was trying to be polite, but at the same time she was physically pushing Hermonie and Ron from the room.

"HARRY!" Hermonie's mind replayed all of the events that had led them there, the man she was certain was a Death Eater, his leering filthy words.

Ron had to physically drag Hermonie from the room, but she fought him the entire time, bucking at him so fiercely that her knee connected with his ribs. He backed her out into the long white hallway that was in front of the emergency trauma room.

"Hermonie-" Ron could only get her name out before she whirled on him.

"He can't die Ron!" to know absolute terror was to listen to her words at that moment. "Please, don't let him die!" she had grabbed his shoulders and was shaking him with the force of the emotions that fueled her words.

"Hermonie stop!" Ron grabbed her head to make her look at him. It was either that or slap her in the face to calm her down, and he didn't suspect she would be too happy about the latter. "We have to tell mum and dad, if that was a Death Eater after Harry they may try again, someone has to be here besides us."

"We can't Ron, what if some one sees them come in there? Pureblood wizards coming to a Muggle Hospital, Death Eaters would be all over St. Mary's!"

"We can't protect Harry by ourselves!" Ron hissed.

"We've done it before!"

"This is different! I may not know anything about gunshot things, but I bloody well know about this! If you or I were in there and Harry was out here he would do the same thing and you know it! If you want to ever kiss the man for real Hermonie we have to do this!"

A flash came across Hermonie's face at the mention of her kissing Harry. It had flittered across her mind scantly over years, but even so she never expected to hear those words from Ron, not here, not now. But there was no time to analyze the expression that fueled Ron's words before he next spoke: "I'm going to find someplace to make it back to the Burrow, you stay here with Harry."

Hermonie was suddenly terrified of the thought of being left alone in a place that could easily be swarming with Death Eaters within the hour. But Hermonie had no intention of leaving Harry by himself. All those doctors in there had no idea, or any type of defense against an entire world of forces that wanting nothing more then to lay waste to the very person they were trying to save. There would be no way they could protect him.

Hermonie turned her full attention to Ron, making sure that every word of her next remark sunk in: "You better hurry up Ronald Weasely or I will hurt you so badly you'll end up back here in an ambulance!"

All Ron did was nod; there would be time for smart remarks later; before turning and briskly walking out of the hallway.

After he left Hermonie stepped back over to the doors of the trauma room. Her eyes looked through the square windows recessed into them, keeping her hand grasped around the wand in her coat the entire time.

XXXXXXXXX

Escaping from the alleyway had been laughingly easy – though he had left the Muggle weapon behind. Not a big matter, he could retrieve it later, the foolish Muggle authorities wouldn't be able to track him. He flexed his wand arm, swiping its willow partner through the air, relishing its fluid movements.

The Muggle weapon had been efficient, but had been very awkward to handle. Its design was primitive compared to the light sturdiness of his wand.

The house he had come into was small and sparsely furnished. A rabbit eared television blared a grainy-pictured news story about a shooting in the south of London:

"Police still have no leads on the shooting that happened here just moments ago-" the young brunette anchorwoman reported in a voice that tried to infuse more excitement into what was already a heated storyline. "The victim was a young man; no word has been issued yet from any of the hospitals in the area as to his identity or his condition. Witness testimony surrounding the fatal shooting has proved dodgy at best as not a single person actually saw the shooting taking place. While searching for the gunman is still their top priority, police are also seeking out a tall redheaded man, and a young woman who were both seen aiding the victim moments after the shot was fired. Authorities hope that these two witnesses will supply them with enough information that will lead to the suspect's arrest-"

The anchorwoman's remarks cut off mid sentence at a blast from his wand that sent red jets flying at the television screen. The old man who owned the house stared at him with hugely frightened eyes. He had been dealt a spell that left him bound rigidly in a rickety wooden chair; and a sock had been stuffed into his mouth to keep him from screaming.

He was outraged. Harry Potter was alive, albeit barely. Still it infuriated him nonetheless. He had counted on Potter's gallant actions towards the Mudblood, but he hadn't counted on the girl actually taking him to a Muggle Healer facility. The Window had proven to be a foolproof method until filthy beings like her had overrun the Wizard World.

He glared down at the shaking Muggle man who was voiceless to try and call out for any kind of help. He smiled, a smile that wasn't happy even in the slightest of forms.

"Avada Kedvara!" A flash of green light emitted from his wand and the Muggle man saw no more.

XXXXXXXXXX

ST. MARY'S HOSPITAL

The ticking of the clock on the wall was a barely audible noise in the otherwise quiet waiting area. However, it was driving Hermione mad and she had to resist casting a muffling charm on it. A gray couch and a row of cushioned green chairs stood behind her, but she turned down their silent invitation to sit down and paced in front of them instead.

The same nurse who had kicked her and Ron out of the trauma room had come out ten minutes later to inform her that Harry was being taken for emergency surgery. The bullet had ripped through the lower lobe of his right lung and still remained imbedded inside the tissue. If it weren't removed immediately it would cause both of his lungs to collapse. After dropping such a piece of news on her the nurse had showed Hermione to the waiting area, which she was currently pacing in.

That encounter had been half an hour ago. Five minutes after she had been shown into the waiting area a doctor came out to speak to her. He wanted to let her know (she had given her name as Alyssa Persons) that the surgery would take at least five hours. That had been the last bit of information she had been given. She had then been left alone in the waiting area without as much as a magazine for distraction.

As she paced one arm remained tucked inside her jacket, her fingers tight around the end of her wand. She clutched it like a sharpshooter with his concealed weapon. There had been no sign of anything out of the ordinary since Ron had left, but Hermione was too smart to believe that that trend would last. A Death Eater didn't just attempt a kill once and then move on – he would be back.

A haunted, protective anger rose up in her at the thought of Harry fighting for his life inside an unfeeling sterile hospital operating room. If he hadn't pushed her out of the way she would have been the one up there or taken as a trophy for a Muggle hating Death Eater. The guilt weald up inside her and she slammed her eyes shut against it's force.

A hand fell on her shoulder. Hermione had her wand pulled out and held up in front of her before she even realized that she had done it.

"Hermione relax, it's me," the gray eyes of Remus Lupin stared back at her. "I a Remus Lupin, who occasionally has a pension for turning into a Werewolf when I don't take my potions, I taught you Defense Against the Dark Arts in your Third Year, you always took the seat next to Harry." Lupin went through the task of identifying himself. Times had become too dangerous for him to allow her to simply trust him with his name alone.

"Professor Lupin," Hermione lowered her wand like it was a heavy stone that she could no longer carry.

"Where's Ron and-"

"They're coming. Ron had to show Arthur and Molly how to get here. The floor plan of this place varies greatly from St. Muguos."

Hermione gave a shaky laugh, but it sounded so forced that Lupin looked at her worriedly. She was covered in Harry's blood that had begun to dry stickily to her clothes, emitting a strong rusted coppery odor.

"Are you alright-" Lupin's question stalled out when he realized that the answer to that was: 'no'. He took her arm, intending on making her sit down, but Ron's figure emerged at that moment through the small entrance of the waiting room. His parents and Ginny were walking right behind him and when Molly Weasely spotted Hermione she made a b-line for her.

"Hermione," Mrs. Weasely wrapped her arms around Hermione's thin frame. "Thank heavens' you're alright!"

Hermione felt the tie to her emotions sever at Mrs. Weasely's words – she being all right wasn't what she was worried about. Hot tears pooled down her face and into the shoulder of the green tweed peacoat the Mrs. Weasely wore.

Molly stroked her hair soothingly. "Harry'll be okay. Everything will be fine."

Hermione released Mrs. Weasely; afraid that she would never stop crying once she had started.

Mrs. Weasely's caring hands wiped away the remainder of her tears. "Have you told your parents about what happened?"

Hermione shook her head so violently that it felt like it was going to snap off. "There wasn't any time. I'll need to find a payphone-"

"I'll help you look," Ginny offered.

"Me too," Ron added.

"First things first," Mrs. Weasely interrupted in a voice that only a mother of six could posses.

"Hermione needs to change clothes before she becomes ill from all this – damp. Ginny can help you with that dear. I brought a few spare things of hers," she pressed a small bundle of clothes into Hermione's hands. "I saw a woman's lavatory back down that long hallway, you can change in there. This business of a payphone will can wait until later, go on." She gave Hermione a gently push when she saw the girl hadn't moved.

"Come on," Ginny urged Hermione forward with a touch on her hand – which was ice cold.

"We'll let you know if we hear any news," Lupin reassured.

Hermione finally got her feet to move and she followed Ginny across the waiting area and back down the hall.

XXXXXXXXXXX

"What's his pressure?" The surgeon asked the scrub nurse that was positioned by Harry's head observing the monitors he was connected to.

"Still falling," The nurse responded from behind her blue surgical mask.

The surgeon cauterized through the wound to widen it to better expose what he was doing. "How long have we been in?"

"Almost an hour," the nurse answered handing him a packet of sterile gauze.

"Keep an eye on his vitals, if they plummet too low we're going to have to pull back or he'll bottom out."

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx

"Harry-"

Harry turned at the sound of Sirius' voice. "Sirius?" his godfather stood before him, floating in a translucent gray haze. "Sirius-" Harry found that his voice had the same quality as air, traveling so lightly across everything. "Am I dead?"

"No," Sirius shook his head. "I'm here only as a memory – this world is where I died-" he swept his arm across the haze, the same color haze as the curtained archway where he had fallen to his death at the hand of Bellatrix Lestrange. "This is where you saw me last so this is where my memory for you will stay."

"If I'm not dead then why are you here?" Harry asked, realizing that he was floating just like Sirius, it was an odd sensation; he stroked his arms across the air as if he were trying to keep himself afloat in the water.

"As a reminder," Sirius' voice was as light as Harry's. "You sacrificed yourself to protect your friend just as I sacrificed myself to protect you. But not every noble act requires an end to your life, it can never be that easy."

"Dying doesn't seem that easy to me." Harry said.

"There are a million ways to die Harry," Sirius laid a hand on Harry's shoulder; his touch radiated a

coolness throughout his body. "But you must find a way to live."

Sirius' image began to fade in front of him.

"Sirius, SIRIUS WAIT!" Harry felt himself being pulled away from this hazy plane of existence and a feeling of nothingness enveloped him again.

XXXXXXXXXXX

Ginny had locked the door to the woman's restroom so that no one else could come in. Several women had already tried to get in, but Ginny had called out that all the toilets had overflowed were being repaired. The women on the other side of the door muttered angrily under their breaths, but their footfalls sounded away from the door as they turned away in search of a working restroom.

Hermione turned on the water in the basin trying to get it warm, but tepid was the best that she could get to come out of the faucet. She cupped some of the water on her face. The blood still on her hands had thinned from contact with the water and a red trail now dripped down her neck. Hermione caught the reflection of the thin liquid bloodstain in the mirror. A heavy breath caught in her throat, she threw off her jacket and yanked her sweater up over her head. She obsessively rinsed the blood off her hands and splashed water on the stain at her neck, obliterating the tiny blood trail. Her hands were beginning to shake so badly that a large amount of the water had pooled down her chest, dampening the edges of her bra.

"Here." Ginny handed her a knitted white cardigan.

Hermione took it from her and slipped into the soft baby wool. Once she was fully dressed again she started for the door. "We have to get back. We've been in here too long."

"Hermione," Ginny ran after her before she could leave, taking a hold of her arm. She hugged Hermione without any formal offer.

Hermione gave a whimper so soft that it went almost undetected. She hugged Ginny back.

"It'll be alright," Ginny echoed her mother's words.

Ginny Weasely was one of Hermione's best friends, Hermione wanted desperately to believe her, but the reality of that night was preventing her from doing so.

"It will." Ginny seemed to read Hermione's mind. "Come on, let's find a payphone to ring your mum and dad." She took Hermione's hand, unlocked the restroom door, and pulled her through it.

XXXXXXXX

"I don't understand why we can't just heal him!" Ron insisted, staring around the room at the older adults, his anger towards the entire situation as red as his hair.

"Ronald keep your voice down, we're in a Muggle facility!" Mrs. Weasely hissed to her son.

"It's not that simple Ron," Remus answered his question. He was leaning against an ancient looking soda machine; he straightened up and walked over to Ron.

Ron's gaze was completely unsated from Remus's answer. "Why the bloody hell not?"

"Ronald!" this time Mrs. Weasely hissed at his use of profanity.

"It's the Window," the answer came from Hermione. She and Ginny rejoined the small gathering, feeling everyone's eyes on them. She had incinerated her bloodstained clothes before leaving the restroom; the freedom of being able to use magic outside of school had been lost to her because of what she had to use it for all night. "Any injury sustained by a Muggle handgun cannot be treated by magical means for 24 hours."

"She's right son," Mr. Weasely agreed. He was standing next to his wife. "After the Muggles invented their gun a hex was put on it to prevent magical healing for a long time. The original intent of this was to deter any wizards from using such non-magic weapons. But after You-Know-Who came to power he began training his followers to use these weapons. Any poor wizard who was hurt by them wouldn't think to come to a Muggle Healer. It was a guarantee that they would die from their injuries before any magical cures could be performed."

"It's disgusting," Hermione added.

"It's damn sick, that's what it is," Mr. Weasely corrected.

Molly shot a reproachful look at her husband. "Hermione-" her gaze shifted to concern. "Sit down here next to me dear," She plucked at Ron's sleeve in a silent order and he vacated the place on the waiting room sofa for Hermione.

Hermione sank into the cushions, hardly feeling the warmth of the fabric over the coldness that had seeped into her skin since the moment she had arrived at St. Mary's.

"Did you speak with your parents?" Mrs. Weasely asked gently.

"They weren't in," Hermione responded. "I left them a voicemail."

Arthur Weasely's expression became silently fascinated when Hermione had mentioned voicemail, but he didn't ask her about it, knowing that now was not the proper time for his Muggle fascination. "Harry was lucky you were there Hermione. If someone hadn't been there who knew how to deal with injuries without magic he would be dead right now."

"There wasn't anything lucky about it Mr. Weasely," Hermione insisted. "Harry wouldn't be here if it wasn't for me." Her words had become quiet, as if admitting them out loud would sentence her to a crime.

"He was hurt protecting me." She lowered her eyes to her hands.

"You can't blame yourself for this Hermione," Lupin told her. "Harry is here because of an evil on the streets, not one in this room. He cares for you. You couldn't stop him from trying to protect you."

"No professor- but I could have tried," Hermione's eyes never rose, and instead they traveled lower, now

staring at the floor.

Mrs. Weasely put an arm around her and Hermione dropped her head to her shoulder.

Lupin rounded the sofa and stood so that he was facing them all head on. "I think I'll try and find this surgery room. There is never such a thing as a Death Eater who only attacks once. I don't find it wise to leave Harry unguarded." He pulled out his wand, and then concealed it up the sleeve of his long gray overcoat. His hand grasped the end of it, ready to pull it out at a single sound. He walked over the long hallway that exited the waiting area, disappearing down it a moment later.

XXXXXXXXXX

He sniffed the air like a dog tracking a scent; in reality he was infiltrating a mind. Not as harshly as his master was known for; it wasn't supposed to be violent. A seduction was much more subtle, not allowing for anyone to be prepared for it because they wouldn't be aware that it was happening until they were already too deeply inside. His eyes closed slowly, feeling into the pulsing of a mind that wasn't his own.

xxxxxxx

"Harry-"

A hand caressed the back of Hermione's hair. Her eyes were closed, but she recognized the touch, even though his hands had never touched her like this before. Her eyes opened slowly and he was there, staring at her, his eyes so dilated that no part of his green irises were visible.

"Harry," Hermione touched the redness of the cuts that marred both his cheeks.

"No," Harry pulled her hand away from his face "I'm fine," he laid her hand against his chest, no gunshot wound evident there. "I'm fine." He pressed her hand to his lips.

Hermione raised the hand he had just kissed and caressed the back of it across his face. Then she was kissing him, her mouth against his so hard that it felt like her lips would bruise.

Harry was kissing her back, his hands raised up to cup both sides of her face, his breath was warm on her skin; holding her to him tightly. Hermione's hand's slid up around his neck, returning his embrace.

A loud echoing bang erupted around them. Hermione heard Harry scream, and all of his weight slammed into her, throwing her down.

xxxxxxxx

A gasp choked in Hermione's mouth.

"Hermione are you okay?"

Hermione's eyes flew open; she felt the rough cloth of the sofa under her. A gray overcoat was draped over her and it slid off of her as she sat up.

Ron was kneeling next to her, a worried expression across his face. "Was it a bad dream?"

"Actually from here it looked like a pretty good dream," Fred Weasley's voice broke in where it hadn't before. He and his twin brother George were sitting in two of the green colored cushioned chairs.

Hermione turned her gaze to Fred. "When did you two get here?"

"We came while you were still asleep. Mum decided you should stretch out," George answered her question. "So was it a good dream?"

Hermione's face turned a slight shade of crimson before it recessed back into her skin. "Is there any news on Harry?"

"None whatsoever," Fred responded.

"These Muggle doctors are complete gits," George elaborated. "It's been two hours and all one of them has managed to tell us is that its: 'only been two hours, so they can't tell us anything yet.'." He leaned back into his chair. "Mum's gone to look for one to give an earful, I pity the poor bastard that she finds."

"They deserve it," Ginny argued. "Two hours and they can't tell us one new thing about Harry!" She was slouched in her seat, mirroring her brother's posture.

"Things might work differently with Muggle healers," Ron suggested. "It might take a longer time to cure him."

"Come off it Ron!" snapped Ginny. "Hermione was raised in a Muggle world and she has the look that you should have. That it isn't right to leave us in the dark this long!"

"Okay so I was lying Ginny!" Ron retaliated on his sister. "Forgive me for being a little on edge after watching Harry get hurt right in front of me! You didn't have to worry about a Death Eater following you to finish Harry off while you were trying to get him here!"

"STOP IT!" Hermione's scream cut off the argument and was so loud that several people in the waiting room turned to stare at her. The receptionist came out from behind her curved desk against the wall and walked over to them.

"Miss this is a hospital!" the receptionists' voice was an angry growl, her eyes glaring at Hermione behind wire-rimmed glasses. "You need to keep the noise level down or you'll have to leave-"

"Leave her alone!" Ron retorted.

"Shove of lady!" George agreed.

Fred joined the defense against Hermione. "None of you people have told her one damn new thing about her boyfriend, she has the right to scream if she wants too!"

The receptionist's eyes blazed with fury, but she didn't say anything else and stormed back to her desk.

"Old baggy prat," Ron muttered under his breath, causing Fred and George to smirk at him in amusement.

"Could those words have come from our baby brother?"

"Looks like Mum's little Ronnie might need to have his mouth washed out," Fred said to George's remark.

Ron rolled his eyes at his brother's ribbing, glancing over at Ginny. "I'm sorry I shouted at you."

"You should be," Ginny returned, but her eyes softened. "But it's been a long night for you so you're forgiven."

XXXXXX

His eyes blinked open, then shut. It hadn't been hard to penetrate her mind; she had been sleeping which had made it all the more easier, he glided into her consciousness almost effortlessly. He felt the airs of her dreams coat him like a filthy slime; the abominations she had committed inside them. But his seduction has fulfilled it's purpose, spilling over into the awareness that had come when she had stopped dreaming. He had seen things, identifiers as to where she was, where Potter was.

Now it was only a matter of time.

XXXXXX

Hermione lay with her head against the cushions of the sofa, eyes closed. She had been like that for several hours but she wasn't asleep. After what had happened the last time she was refraining from doing so. But her eyes felt like they couldn't stay open, so she lay there trying to rest and fight off actual sleep at the same time.

She felt the cushion beside her sink slightly as someone sat next to her. Someone had been doing that regularly. Several times she had opened her eyes in small slits and caught sight of Ginny or Ron - sometimes all of them watching her. They were worried about her; she seemed the most profoundly affected by what had happened that night.

"Hermione."

She blinked her eyes open at the sound of Ron's voice like it had just roused her. She turned her head a fraction to look at him, but didn't raise it from the back of the sofa. "Is there any news?"

"Mum came back while you were sleeping, she said she ran into a doctor, but he only told her that the surgery was still going on."

Hermione hadn't been asleep so she had actually heard the conversation between Mrs. Weasely and the doctor, but Ron was looking at her with such concern that she didn't have the heart to contradict him.

"Ran into," Fred repeated that phrase in disbelief. "Mum most likely tore the man a new one."

"Fred!" Ginny did such a good impression of their mother that Fred whipped his head around, thinking that she had come up behind him.

All of them laughed quietly, it started off shaky at first, but then it gradually became stronger. They had been suffocating in tension all night and were grateful for a small amount of release.

"Are you feeling any better?" Ron asked Hermione, watching her to see if her answer would be in sync with the way she actually looked.

"I won't be until I know that Harry's okay," Hermione's expression was as firm as her voice. "Not just words, I want to see him."

"I do too," Ron agreed. "This whole night has been one bloody mess!"

"Ronald!"

Ron turned with a glare on his sister, "Ginny cut that out!"

Ginny stared back at up at Ron in complete confusion. "I didn't say anything-" "Mum," Ginny stood up at the sight of her mother walking briskly towards them, a tall man in surgical scrubs walked beside her.

At the sight of the surgeon everyone else stood up, their attention fully locked on him.

"How's Harry?" Ginny questioned this stranger, not asking, demanding.

The surgeon turned to look at her. "Are you Alyssa?"

"Alyssa?" Ron cut in, "What are you talking-"

Hermione cut Ron off by stepping across his feet as she stepped over to the surgeon. "I am."

The surgeon watched in confusion as Ron grimaced at the feeling of just having his toes stepped on before turned his attention to Hermione. "We finished the surgery on your husband Mrs. Pearsons."

"Husband? Pearsons?" Fred's tone was complete bewilderment. "How much air do you doctors get in that place-'Ah!' Fred hissed. Ginny had just knocked him on the back of the head.

Ginny didn't know exactly what was going on, but she was smart enough to know that it was a plan that would fall apart if Fred didn't shut up.

The bewilderment on the surgeon face rose even higher, but let it fall away a second later sensing what was going on between them was too complex to deal with in one day. "It went as well as could be expected," the surgeon finished the words he had been cut off in. "He's been moved to recovery."

"I want to see him," Hermione's words – like Ginny's – weren't a request.

"Of course," the surgeon agreed with her. "But right now I'm only allowing family-" his words had to catch up with Hermione who had begun to walk towards the only hallway that exited the tiny waiting room she had been stuck in for over five hours.

He hurried after her, being bumped against the wall by Fred and George pushing past him to join Hermione in the lead.

"It's okay," Fred reassured the doctor. "We were in the wedding."

The hallway ended after a few feet and opened into an airy concourse with a black marble tiled floor whose surface glittered under the shine of the florescent lighting overhead. A row of six elevators stood lined up evenly between a large marbled image of the Virgin Mary with her arms out stretched over a group of marble newborn lambs and children at her feet. An inscription above her head – carved into a bronze plaque – bore the hospitals motto: "Bring in those who cannot help themselves and they shall be healed".

An elevator door just to the right of the statue opened and a group of people stepped off, and the surgeon – who's name was Michael's – waited for them to all walk out before ushering the Weasely's and Hermione inside the car.

Dr. Michael's pressed the button for the seventh floor and the car began its climb.

Ginny stood against the back wall of the elevator next to her mother. She turned to her and whispered: "Where's dad and Professor Lupin?"

"There with Harry," Molly whispered back. "They managed to find where the doctors had placed him afterwards; it's not safe to leave him alone with only Muggles about."

"Did they say anything about how he looked?" Ginny asked.

Mrs. Weasely shook her head sadly before responding: "No dear, they didn't."

The elevator car slowed to a halt and the doors pulled open. Dr. Michael's turned around to the group "It's to the right." He stepped through the doors and they followed.

They had stepped out into a long hallway. The walls were painted a sage green, but no one would notice because they were broken up by huge windows that ran the whole length of the hallway walls of each of the rooms. Green colored curtains that matched the sparse bit of visible paint were closed on some of the windows.

Dr. Michaels stopped in front of one of these – directly across from a round desk pod where a lone nurse sat scribbling some down on a chart. He twisted the metal handle on the door and pulled it open, a strong antiseptic smell assaulted all of their noses.

"He's still very weak-"

Dr. Michael's words faded into the background as Hermione stepped into the room, followed closely by the Weasely's.

Harry lay in the bed on his back, his head tilted slightly to the right side on the pillow, the skin there pale, with a glistening of sweat around the corners; a nasal cannula curved around both cheeks. Two IV needles were inserted into each of his forearms; one of them ran into a bag of antibiotic solution, the other was hooked up to two liters of blood.

Hermione raised her hands to her mouth when she saw all of this; behind her Mrs. Weasely was doing the same thing. She stepped into the room, hearing the beeping of an EKG machine monitor positioned beside the bed. She could see Mr. Weasely and Remus Lupin standing in the recessed corners of the room, but she barely noticed their presence at all.

"The bullet hit the bottom half of one of his lungs. We were able to repair all the damage but he'll need to be watched very closely over the next several hours for complications." Dr. Michaels watched the eyes of all the people in the room gaze up at his at the word 'complications'. But he didn't elaborate more. "I'll give you all fifteen minutes." The words were an order as Dr. Michaels stepped out of the room, closing the door quietly behind him.

"Fifteen minutes?" Fred's hissed in a whisper to George. "That's five minutes less then what St. Muguos allows for visiting."

"Harry-" Mrs. Weasely stepped closer as well, taking in all the tubes and monitors, the beeping of the EKG monitor beside his bed, loud foreign things to her. She turned to her husband. "Arthur-"

"He's alive Molly," Mr. Wesley told her gently.

"He doesn't look that way lying there so still," Mrs. Weasely argued, her voice was tearful.

"Mum please," Ginny pleaded.

Hermione sat down on the edge of the bed, oblivious to the conversations that were going on around her. "Harry," she took his hand, tracing the back of it lightly with her thumb. "Harry please-" the next words were lost on a painful emotion that choked in her throat. A tear splashed onto his hand. "I'm so sorry."

xxxxxxxxx

Harry remembered nothing after the haze, a nothingness that had engulfed him like a black vortex, pulling him down, away from Sirius, away from the mists of the other world.

But the nothingness had began to shake away, like ice chunks falling from a glacier. He became aware of his senses individually. First the muffled voices and sound of beeping that seemed to surround him, then the strong odor of sterility, and finally a dull throbbing pain that encompassed his entire body.

He felt his eyes beginning to rise on their own; wanting to end their torture of having been closed for so long.

"Harry?" a voice calling him, followed by a touch on his hand. His eyes had opened, but his vision was blurry. The light touch of his glasses slid onto his face, and the blurriness of the world came into focus.

"Hermione?" she was leaning over him, the whitness of her sweater and her honey colored hair seemingly making her glow under the lighting in the room. Ugly red marks were scratched into the right side of her face. The scene from alleyway came flooding back to him, the man aiming at her, the sound of the gun, her screams. "Are you okay?"

Hermione's eyes became colored in worry. "You pushed me out of the way; he shot you instead. Don't you remember?"

The relentless pain that traveled up Harry's body with each breath wouldn't let him forget being shot. He had never been in a hospital before, but the smell of anaseptic hung in the air like it had done at the doctor's office where he had gone too for vaccinations during primary school – so he knew that he was in one. "Where's Ron?"

"Right here mate," Ron stepped closer to the bed. "I'm alright. But you gave us a bit of a scare." His eyes were as worried as Hermione's.

"More then just a bit," Lupin corrected Ron.

Harry turned in surprise at the sound of Lupin's voice. "Professor Lupin, what are you doing here?"

"You've been seriously hurt Harry, that's what I'm doing here," Lupin informed. "It was too dangerous to leave you unprotected after a Death Eater attack."

Harry's mind was whirling on the sudden slam of confusing information that had just propelled into it. He had heard Hermione mention a Death Eater immediately after the attack, but his thoughts had been clouded in pain then. Having it repeated again when he was more lucid drew it deeper into reality. "But he used a gun-"

"Magic can't cure gunshot wounds right away Harry," Hermione gave him the abridged version of the meaning of the Window. "He wanted you to die of your injuries before anything could be done. He wasn't counting on Ron and I bringing you here."

Harry didn't question how Hermione knew this information; she had been full of random knowledge as long as he'd known her.

But one question still danced around his mind. The man – this Death Eater – he had been aiming the gun at Hermione, not him. If he had wanted to shoot him he could have just done it, so why hadn't he? All these thoughts were beginning to give him a headache; he rubbed his thumb in-between his eyes, trying clear away the relentlessness chatter they created in his head. His actions hadn't gone unnoticed.

"Are you alright?" Hermione asked, she had been the recipient of that same question all night, but she was concerned.

"I'm fine," Harry lied. His entire right side was throbbing with a pain rose that was much worse than he felt the time his cousin Dudley had used him as a personal punching bag in second grade.

Hermione seemed to sense that he wasn't telling the truth. "Should I call for the nurse?"

"I said I'm fine!" Harry snapped back at her, felling guilty for it a moment later when a look of genuine hurt came across her expression. "Sorry." The marks on her face were much redder then he had realized before. He raised his hand, tracing across any angry one her left cheek. "You should get Ron's mum to fix those."

"They're just scratches Harry," Hermione told him.

Harry's finger lingered half a second longer then they should have before he dropped it back down on the bed.

"Just what is in this bag?" Mr. Weasely had his face so close to the antibiotic IV bag that he came dangerously close to slashing his eyes on the bag's sharp plastic seams.

"That's how Muggle doctors give medicines," Hermione informed.

"Really?" Mr. Weasely's fascination grew. He removed the bag from the pole, tilting it first upside down, then rotating it around – pulling at the tubing and the needless catheter in Harry's arm causing him to grimace audibly.

"Sorry, sorry, I didn't realize you were attached," Mr. Weasely apologized hanging the bag back on the hook of the IV pole. "These Muggles have very fascinating medical treatments."

"Harry has suffered enough tonight Arthur Weasely! He doesn't need you to add to it by your ill conceived fascination with Muggle gadgetry!" Molly Weasely's tirade on her husband made all of her children grateful that her anger wasn't directed at them. "For heaven's sake, he nearly died!"

An entity of silence escaped into the room after her words, reminding them with images, smells, sounds just how close Harry had come to cheating death that night.

"Molly we need to focus on the fact that Harry didn't die," Lupin spoke out. "A fact that will no doubt enrage this Death Eater and will surely make him try even harder."

"Harry," Lupin stepped closer to the to the bed. "Did you see what this man looked like?"

Harry closed his eyes for a second, trying to recall a face, hair color, anything, but there was nothing. "It was dark, he was dressed like a Muggle. But I couldn't get a clear look before it happened."

"Did he say anything to you beforehand?"

"Not to me-" Harry said, glancing over at Hermione "He spoke to Hermione – a lot of filthy trash that I'm not going to repeat."

Hermione glanced back at him before her eyes met Remus' "It wasn't anything significant Professor. But Ron and I couldn't get a good look at him either before he ran off."

"The bloody coward shot off as soon as he done it," Ron said. "There were too much of a crowd to find him before Hermione and I Disaparted with Harry."

"You Disaparated in an entire crowd of Muggles?" Mrs. Weasely said, in a voice that was part shocked but more angry. "Ronald Arthur Weasely what on earth where you thinking! You could've been seen!"

"Harry was in trouble Mum!" Ron argued. "Those dumb Muggle hospital vehicles would never have gotten through all those people, we didn't have a choice! No one saw anything, Hermione cast a Diversionary Spell before we did it."

"Molly please calm down," Arthur spoke in a soothing, but insistent voice to his wife. "You heard him, they didn't have a choice. They were trying to protect Harry, the Ministry doesn't condone magic used for those purposes."

"The Ministry has changed recently Arthur, or have you so quickly forgotten?!"

"Mrs. Weasely please-" Harry's voice cut into the heated argument. "If they hadn't done it I would be dead." Molly's earlier remark on the subject had silenced them all, but not as profoundly as Harry stating that reality himself. All eyes on the room settled on him. "They saved me."

Hermione rubbed his arm. "You saved me first," her voice was so quiet that only Harry picked it up and their eyes met at a halfway point in the air. The sadness that came from Hermione's words coupled with that gaze created an emotion that settled over them like a heavy fog. The fog was lifted when Hermione cut through it by breaking contact with Harry's gaze and settled it on Lupin. "Do you really think a Death Eater would try and attack Harry here, Professor? It's completely public to Muggles, it would expose magic."

Voldemort's Death Eaters were masters of the Dark Arks, but Dark and White Magic were connected like the two sides of a coin, and their worry over exposure was the same as the wizards in the room.

"Death Eaters long ago gave up caring about the laws that govern magic Hermione," Lupin responded in his deep, melodramatic voice that always commanded attention. "The risk of exposing magic is infinitesimal for them compared to the victory they will have achieved by killing Harry. Which is why he needs to be protected."

"I can protect myself," Harry said adamantly. As if to contradict him the sutured wound in his side throbbed so painfully that he hissed. Hermione stroked his arm again, but this time it was unwelcome. He didn't want to be reminded of how weak he was.

"You're injuries are very serious Harry," Lupin returned. "Until they can be cured by magic you're vulnerable. You have played the hero many times already my boy, let someone look out for you for a change."

Hermione's touch on his arm and Lupin's remark sent a wave of anger coursing through Harry. He had never wanted to 'play a hero' his life had forced him into that role. And he wasn't a baby, he didn't need someone to look after him, he could handle himself.

A platinum blonde nurse in crisp white scrubs entered the room. "Visiting hours are over, you'll have to come back tomorrow."

"Maybe for Harry they are," Fred muttered to George, his eyes roaming over the figure of the young nurse that was extremely evident under her uniform.

"Muggle Hospitals aren't so bad after all," George agreed 'appreciating' the same things on the nurse that Fred was.

"Oh dear," Mrs. Weasely was flustered at having to leave so abruptly, completely missing her two sons visually undressing the nurse. She picked up her small handbag from where she had thrown it in the chair beside the bed and stepped over to Harry's bedside. "We'll come back later dear," she kissed the side of his face.

Lupin touched Harry on the hand. "Some of use more quickly then others."

Mr. Weasely touched his shoulder briefly. "We won't be very far my boy."

"See ya Harry," Ron said. "Try and get some sleep around all that noise." he indicated the EKG machine and the quieter beeping of the IV pump.

Ginny kissed Harry lightly on the nose, laughing when she did so because it was so childish, but she didn't want to pull out any tubes. "I think you almost scared Hermione into marrying you," she said quietly. She had gone out with Harry during their sixth year, but they had broken up not long afterwards. She still cared for him a great deal, but she had come to realize that Harry would never care for anyone the way he cared for Hermione.

Harry stared at Ginny the way he stared at anyone who mentioned he and Hermione outside the context of friendship. But it wasn't as strong as it could've been because he didn't want to dwell on anything right now.

Ginny turned and joined the trickle of people that were leaving out the door, leaving only Hermione still in the room sitting on the edge of Harry's bed.

"I'll let you get some rest." She kissed the top of his head. Harry could still hear Remus' "playing the hero" line repeating over and over in his head. And the way Hermione had touched him afterwards– the same feeling coming from the kiss she had just given him, like she was his mother. He closed his eyes, pretending to have fallen asleep so she wouldn't be prompted to say anything to him.

Hermione seem to fall for the charade because she stood up quietly from the bed and walked out the door under the glare of the young nurse who was upset with her for staying after she had already asked everyone to leave.

The nurse walked up to Harry's bed, checking the numbers on all the monitors and writing things down on the chart she had brought with her. He feigned sleep the entire time, even when she raised a corner of his shirt to inspect the drainage of the bandage wrapped around his side.

He wanted nothing more then to point his wand at her to get her to leave him alone, but he heard the sounds of her footfalls leaving his bedside at the same moment he realized that he didn't know where his wand was. A wizard's wand was an appendage to their body; and without it the exposure Harry felt even superceded the nakedness he felt in the thin hospital gown.

It had been in the back pocket of his jeans; he hadn't even time to raise it when he heard the sound of the gun's trigger being pulled, it had to still be there. Unless it fell when he did, or worse yet – snapped it half. He knew hospitals stowed personal effects inside bags and had them in the room; he had to look and see if his wand was among all his other things.

But unbeknownst to Harry the nurse who had just left had pushed 10 milligrams of a sedative pain killer into the port in his IV and it's effects were now washing over him, fleeing all thoughts from his mind as it pulled him into sleep.

XXXXXXXXX

"Here," Mrs. Weasely pulled another gray blanket from the depths of her small handbag that she had cast a bottomless charm on. She had just handed out five other such identical blankets. "If you insist upon being ridiculous you're at least going to be warm doing so."

"Molly, we're in the Order," Lupin said, folding the blanket in half hand laying it on the back of a chair. "We have to remain here to protect Harry – the Burrow is too far away if anything happened, even by Apartating."

Mrs. Weasely shook out one of the blankets, sending a spray of dust out from it. "I didn't mean you and Arthur, Remus; I was referring to this lot-" she cast a stern look at her four children and Hermione. She had wanted them all to return to the Burrow, but they had all adamantly refused.

"Fred and I are in the Order too mum," George reminded.

"Fine, but Ron, Hermione and Ginny aren't," Mrs. Weasely's tempter was flared so high that each individual word sounded like a stinging retort.

"We can't leave Mrs. Weasely," Hermione said.

"Yeah mum," Ron chimed in. "Did you honestly expect us to sleep when a Death Eater could attack Harry at any moment?"

"That's why I want you all home! I want you to be safe!"

"Harry isn't going to be safe mum," Ginny threw herself into the argument.

Mrs. Weasely looked as ready to explode as a box of Fred and George's fireworks next to an open flame. It was the utter distraught look on Hermione's face – placed there for effect, but more so unconsciously done – that finally undid her enough. "You stay with your father and Professor Lupin the entire time, none of this wandering off on your own UNDERSTAND?"

"Yes Mum," George gave a little curtsey only missing the clout Mrs. Weasely dealt his head by ducking down to spread his blanket on the floor.

"You can have the sofa," Ron offered to Hermione. "I'm not going to be doing much sleeping anyway."

"Neither am I," Hermione's said, yawning a second later. She was tired, but her senses were too wound up to let her sleep anymore. "Ginny can have it."

"You two are completely mental if you think I'm going to be doing any sleeping," Ginny corrected. She lowered her voice to just above a whisper when she spoke next: "I'm actually waiting until mum falls asleep so I can check out this entire floor. There's no way dad and Professor Lupin can be alert to this whole place by themselves."

"Good luck slipping under mum's detection," Ron argued. "She was sound asleep once and she still hit me square between the eyes with a shoe brush for making too much noise."

"You're such a girl Ronald Weasely," Ginny returned. "I've slipped under mum's guard plenty of times – you just have to know how to be really cautious and subtle about it."

Ron looked at his sister incredulously: "You weren't by chance doing this to sneak around with any boys were you?"

"Yes I was if you must know. Harry and I did it a couple of times when mum stayed at Hogwarts that day you forgot your potions book and she felt the need to bring it to you personally-"

"Please you two!" Hermione interrupted.

"Sorry," Ginny apologized, not just for the interruption but also for the reference to when she and Harry had been dating.

Another look of disbelief came across Ron's face, but this time it was disbelief over himself, and this time it was directed at Hermione. There had been an attraction Ron had felt for her ever since he had known her. Hermione had somewhat reciprocated it, but as they grew older he saw a deeper bond forming. Not between he and Hermione, but rather between her and Harry, though neither of them had ever admitted to it. Harry had even gone so far once as to claim that Hermione was more like a sister to him then anything else. But Ron had never looked at Ginny the way he had often caught Harry looking at Hermione.

"You really like him don't you?"

"Gee what was your first clue?" Ginny said sarcastically.

Ron shot daggers at her at the same time Hermione adapted a look on her face that said didn't know what either of them were talking about. She quickly changed the subject: "A million Death Eaters could parade into Harry's room if we just stand here talking." She pulled out her wand, her actions a catalyst that made Ron and Ginny do the same.

Mrs. Weasely had gone in search of something hot to drink – trying to refrain from doing magic as much as possible to avoid exposure to the Muggles. Fred and George had gone off with their father down one end of the endless hallway while Lupin was patrolling in the opposite direction.

"Come on," Ginny said turning to Hermione. "Let's go protect your man." She left the group so quickly that the only thing Hermione could do in response was to follow her, with Ron closely behind.

xxxxxxxxx

The entranceway of the facility was lit with the glowing lighting that the Muggles prided themselves so much on. A glass door on an electric sensor opened and closed as Muggles in various costumes entered and left the building into the foggy darkness of London.

He inhaled the scent again – he was here. He dropped the hood of his cloak from his head to better see the building – he had discarded the filthy Muggle clothing in another alleyway. If he was going to kill Harry Potter he was going to do so proudly.

Several of the windows on the eight story structure were lit up with the same electric glow as the entranceway, but the darkened windows is what he focused on, he knew he was in one of those. He

closed his eyes, concentrating, seeing a thin, pale face emerge from the blackness. It wore no glasses, but the features were unmistakable. The energy around him was weak, it was a perfect opportunity.

xxxxxxx

The hallways were a darkened gray, lit only by floodlights recessed every few yards into the tiled ceiling. The hospital staff had to see what they were doing but the overhead lights were shut off after a certain hour to allow patients more darkness to sleep in.

Tiny pinpoints of light moved through this darkness, emitting from the tips of the three wands held out in front of their owners. Hermione's eyes roamed over the maze of rooms, seeing patients hooked up to respirators and chest tubes in some of the rooms that had their curtains pulled open. The floor was quiet except for the occasional light stepping of nurses in clogs or cross trainers as they made their checks on the rooms.

A few of these nurses had crossed paths with them, and they had to lower their wands and extinguish their light. Ginny had made up lies about wanting to find a bathroom, pretending to listen intently as directions were given – having to state to one of the nurses who came upon them a second time that they were still searching for them.

"This is useless!" Ron whispered to them, very frustrated at having from just having to lower his wand and put out his light for the eighth time. "There's nothing out here."

"Well you honestly didn't expect someone to just waltz over to us and shout out: 'I'm a Death Eater!' did you?" Ginny whispered back. In the darkness she didn't see the glare Ron was shooting at her, but even if she did she wouldn't have given it much attention. She had grown up with five brothers, she was used to being glared at.

There was a quiet rustling ahead of them, like the sound of a cloak scraping against one of the pieces of medical equipment that were lined up in the hallway. They stepped forward cautiously, wands raised. A tall dark figure stood down the hallway, the long thin outline of a wand hanging from his hand.

"Get behind me," Ron said, hoping the shaking in his hand wasn't present in his voice. He raised his wand higher. He saw the figure turn, spotting them and the shadowed hand holding the wand rose higher as well.

"Stupif-"

"Ron?"

"Fred?"

"FRED?"

"Ginny?" Fred lit the tip of his wand and held it up, seeing the stunned faces in front of him. "Well know that we know who everyone is, what are you doing here?"

"Us?" Ron cried. "We thought you were a bloody Death Eater! Sneaking around like that!"

"In my defense Ron you and the girls were supposed to be asleep," Fred returned, lowering his wand.

"Don't give us that load," Ginny cut in, not lowering hers. "You knew bloody well that we wouldn't be! Where's George?"

"We split up down separate hallways back there, this place is a maze. There's no chance of dad and Lupin covering it all alone."

"Why do you think we're here you git?" Ron said, his heart still pounding from having almost hexed his own brother, and still thinking on it for Fred having scared him so much.

"Did you see anything?" Hermione asked Fred.

Fred shook his head. "Just a lot of poor bastards who are worse off then Harry, connected to all sorts of tubes and machines."

A sigh of angry frustration heaved in Hermione's chest; she cast a glance behind her. She wasn't pining to meet any Death Eaters again tonight, but every second that no one had managed to flush him out tore deeper into the hole of guilt inside of her. "We have to keep looking-" a bright light suddenly flittered across her vision.

"Hermione?" Ginny said, seeing her sudden shift in expression.

The light intensified, growing hot and white. Hermione gasped as she felt in crawl into her mind, the force of it knocked her off her feet.

"Hermione!" Fred caught her as she fell sideways.

/The white light exploded and filled into the colors of a room. A man, tall, cloaked in a dark hooded robe towered over Harry's bed, raising a slender willow wand.

Harry stirred in the bed, his eyes snapped open, he saw the man. He tried to get up out of the bed, furiously looking around the room for his wand. His injuries made him slow, and the pain threw him back on the bed in a gasp.

The man smiled leeringly, the same smile he had given in the alleyway. "Don't worry Harry Potter, you won't feel pain much longer. He raised his wand higher. "Avada Kedvara!" A flash of green light exploded inside the room./

"No!!" Hermione screamed.

"Hermione!" Ron shook her hard. "Hermione wake up!"

"What's going on? Is she okay?"

"She's fine," Fred told the nurse who had run up to them. "She just slipped on a spill." He bewitched a Code Blue alarm above a patient's room and it went off with a cry sending the nurse running for an emergency cart.

Hermione's eyes snapped open, Ron's face swam into view. "I saw him, he's going to kill Harry!"

"Hermione you fainted!" Ron told her, pulling her to her feet.

"What do you mean you saw him?" Ginny asked.

"He was there, in the room, with Harry, he used the Killing Curse."

"You mean you actually saw into his head, you saw him killing Harry?" Fred asked.

"I wasn't in his head," Hermione answered frantically. "I was watching from inside the room," the hand holding her wand was soaked with sweat and she wiped it across her pants before grasping it more tightly. "We have to get back to Harry!"

"Hermione slow down!" Ron said. "A Death Eater put visions inside Harry's head the day Sirius was killed, how do you know that this isn't some kind of trap?"

"The Death Eater is trying to kill Harry, not us!" Hermione persisted. "I have to make sure he's okay."

"You? You're not going there by yourself," Ginny said matter-of-fact.

"There's more of a chance that he's out here then in Harry's room," Hermione told her. "Someone has to be out here with your dad and Professor Lupin; I'll be fine." She didn't feel as confidant as she sounded.

"But what if you're not?" Ron questioned.

"I'm not leaving Harry by himself!" Hermione yelled back. She wasn't use to taking the lead, Harry had always done that, but the same force that he had always used in his words was now being used in hers.

"Okay," Fred said after a moment, realizing that nothing they would say would get her to change her mind. "But if anything goes wrong, call for Ron- no wait, call for Ginny, she's stronger then Ron."

Hermione managed a very small smile, pocketing her wand so she could sprint faster.

"Be careful," Ron said.

Hermione turned and ran back down the hallway towards Harry's room.

xxxxxxxx

Her brown oxford's skidded to a stop in front of Harry's room. She paused for a moment to catch her breath then pulled the wand from the back pocket of her jeans. She held it out in front of her with one hand and turned the door handle with the other.

She kept a hold on the metal handle to keep the door from being pushed open too fast and too noisily. She stepped lightly inside the room, and lit her wand, closing the door so the nurses wouldn't see her light.

The room was quiet except for the incessant beeping and clicking of the monitors by the bedside; it was also empty except for Harry. A small bathroom stood off to the left in a small corner; Hermione moved quietly over to it, casting her small light around the tiled walls. That small room was also empty.

A light clicked on. "Who's there?"

Hermione spun around to see Harry awake and staring at her.

The medications had left him drowsy, but the confusion on his face was no less because of it. She was blurry because he wasn't wearing his glasses, but he could somewhat make her out. "Hermione-"

"Did you see anyone come in?" Hermione asked, snuffing out the light on her wand as she drew closer to shine of the florescent lamp that lit the bed.

"No," Harry said, finding his glasses and pulling them on. "I've been asleep."

"I'm sorry, I didn't mean to wake you."

"Hermione what's going on?" Harry watched her walk around the room, gazing into corners, tapping at the plastic of a trash bin with her wand.

"Where's your wand?" she asked.

"Good question," Harry told her, willing to drop her change in subject for now. "I haven't seen it. Check for a bag or something with my clothes in it– look in that wardrobe over there."

Hermione pulled opened the thin plywood doors of the piece of unpainted furniture, feeling in the dark, her fingers brushed against the rattling plastic of a large bulky bag. She pulled it out and rummaged through it. His shoes were at the top of the pile, but his shirt wasn't there, the doctors in the Emergency Room had to cut it off of him. His jeans were next in the pile, but when Hermione reached into both of their back pockets she didn't feel anything. Her heart pounded – the doctors could have thrown it out. After all, it probably just looked like nothing but a stick to them. She could feel Harry's eyes on her and she avoided his gaze to hide her worry. She felt around in the bottom of the bag and finally, her fingers closed around it. She pulled it from the bag.

"Does it look okay?" Harry asked her anxiously.

Hermione held the wand up closely, examining it. The intricate weaving of the wood was unscratched. "It seems to be fine." She waved it around, the smoothness of it's motion much more powerful then her own wand. She cast a summoning spell, and a frog plodded onto her hand – called for from the small fountain in the hospital's courtyard. She transfigured it into a long stemmed blood red rose with completely unfolded petals. "There doesn't appear to be any damage."

She walked over to the bed, intending on handing Harry his wand, but the rose she had just crated had large, nasty thorns and one of them sliced at the back of her hand making her grimace audibly.

Harry sat up in the bed as much as he could. "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Hermione sucked at the scratch, the taste of the blood throwing her into an unwanted memory of the last time she had tasted blood in her mouth.

Harry saw a thin red trail trickle down her hand. "You're bleeding."

"Stop trying to bloody protect me all the time!!"

The raw angered emotion in her tone cracked a sudden heat in the room. Harry stared at her and she stared back at him.

"You could have died, what were you thinking!?" She was breathing hard from her outburst.

"I didn't have a choice," Harry's words were heavier then any stone. "I wasn't going to just sit there and watch him shoot you."

Hermione stepped the rest of the way over to his bed and sat down next to him, staring as hard as she could into his eyes. "Why do you always have to protect me?" Her eyes closed in a saddened pain.

"How can't I?" Harry's said, his voice a sad affirmation that told her he would never think twice about trying to protect her.

Tears splashed from Hermione's eyes. She took Harry's hand in both of hers and pressed it to her lips. She sighed a sigh choked with more agonizing tears and leaned over and kissed him, pressing both her hands against the sides of his face. She tasted the saltiness of one of her tears that had fallen on her lips.

Harry pulled her away, holding her head in his hands as she was doing to him. He roamed his eyes over every contour of her face and when he got to her eyes, he saw his reflection in them. He pulled her back down to him, kissing her back, sliding a hand to the back of her neck.

"Forgive me for interrupting-" the voice was dark, ominous. A hooded figure stood there, his eyes covered in a dark mask. A long, sinewy wand was outstretched in his hand, pointing at them. His masked eyes settled on Harry with a deathly gaze. "The famous Harry Potter – wounded beyond all magical repair." He strode over to the bed. "Forced to be cared for by a pack of Muggles. If their mundane weaponry had better aim you could have been spared this embarrassment."

"Get. Out." Hermione's words were chillingly cold. She stood up from the bed, her wand raised at the Death Eater's heart.

The same leering smile that he had presented to her in the alleyway pulled across his face. "How touching. I knew that once I penetrated your mind that you would lead me directly to Potter. Your thoughts are so infinitely pliable that it was mundanely easy to get inside them, to see into your abominable dreams-"

"Stupify!"

The Death Eater cast a shield charm that repelled Hermione's spell. "You foolish girl – did you really think that your membership in an after class club would be able to protect you?" "Expeliamus!" he cast the disarming spell so quickly that Hermione's wand flew from her hand before she could block it.

"I will perform a double service for my master tonight. Ridding him of Harry Potter and a filthy Muggle." He cast a powerful stunning spell that hit Hermione squarely in the chest, sending her flying backwards in the room and crashing into the glass window that looked out over the city.

The glass exploded like a bomb showering over Hermione as she dropped to the floor.

"Expeliamus!" Harry screamed, his wand raised. He climbed over the edge of the bed, feeling the stitches – along with the injured flesh – rip apart, and the IV catheters tear away from his arms.

The Death Eater blocked the spell expertly. "Avada Kedavra!" Green light shot from his wand.

Harry grabbed a small handheld mirror that was lying on a night table and held it up; the curse deflected off the glass and rebound upon the Death Eater. He blocked it and sent it flying out the shattered window where it struck a stray cat that had been wandering around the hospital alleyway. The animal spun like a top and then fell over dead on the pavement.

Outside the room, several of the nurses screamed in stunned confused terror at all the flashes of light and the noises coming from inside. A security guard grabbed a woman who was standing in the hallway next to Harry's room and threw her to the ground as Stunning Spell blasted out from the inside window.

Another security guard bust into Harry's room, his black Beretta aimed in front of him. "Freeze!"

The Death Eater laughed with maniacal dryness. A fine dust of glass particles had coated themselves over his black cloak. He seized Hermione by the hair and thrust his wand at her throat. He made no move on the security guard who was staring at him too dumfounded to be a threat.

Harry walked slowly around the hospital bed – his bare feet being sliced on the glass fragments that littered the white tiled floor; his wound screaming out in pain. But he felt none of it. His wand was raised at the Death Eater, seeing Hermione struggle under his grip.

"If you hurt her I will kill you."

"Noble words," The Death Eater jabbed the tip of his wand into the hollow of Hermione's neck. "Wasted on a common Mudblood whore." He saw Harry's chest heave in crushing anger at his words. "But don't worry Potter. I'm not going to hurt her. I'm going to kill her, right here in front of you. Once you witness that disposing of you will be an easy task."

Hermione squirmed under him; she managed to free one of her hands and reached for a large chunk of the shattered window that was lying at her knees. She grabbed the jagged glass and sliced viciously at the Death Eater's hand.

He roared and his grip on the wand at her neck loosened. "Filthy bitch!" He shot another Stunning Spell at her.

Harry seized Hermione and threw her to the ground, sending them both crashing to the floor. The red jets of the Stunning Spell sailed over their heads and impacted a crack into the wall behind them.

Hermione spotted her fallen wand lying partway under the bed. She clawed at it and raised it at the Death Eater. "Stupefiy!"

He was knocked off his feet; his wand was thrown from his hand and skittered across the floor. It was this scene that finally roused the security guard, sending a jolt of insane energy coursing through him.

"Stop or I'll fire!" The guard didn't wait for his own orders. He fired rounds from his gun in rapid succession. Bullets tore through the hospital room, winging of the side rails of the bed; ripping holes into the walls, one of them blew apart the IV bags, spraying the remains of the donor blood everywhere.

Harry crawled across the floor to Hermione, throwing himself on top of her, shielding her from the shots with his head and arms.

The last three bullets from the guards clip were shot off at the same moment the Death Eater cried: "Accio Wand!"

The wand flew into his hand, and he raised it at the guard who's stared at him in terror standing in the empty shells of his expelled rounds. He slashed his wand in a downward movement.

"No!" Hermione knew all to well the spell he was about to inflict on the guard. It was the same one Dolohov had used on her inside the Ministry of Magic. She pulled away from Harry and threw herself on the Death Eater's back, choking his neck with her hands and arms.

"Hermione!" Harry screamed.

He turned and flung Hermione off him, knocking into the guard and sending him toppling to the ground. He dropped on top of her, pinning her down with a crushing weight. "I never got that present," his breath was hot, his wand sliced down her sweater.

Harry scrambled off the floor and punched the Death Eater in the back of the head. "Get off of her!" he dealt another fierce blow that connected with the side of his jaw. "GET OFF OF HER!"

The Death Eater pulled off of Hermione, momentarily stunned at Harry's use of bare-knuckled fighting.

But he quickly regained his bearings and aimed his wand at Harry. "Avada Kedav-"

"STUPEFY!"

The Death Eater sailed across the room, crashing against the already broken inside window. Ginny tore into the room, her wand still raised.

The Death Eater began to climb back up from the floor.

"Reducto!" George shot the spell from out in the hallway – his aim on the Death Eater's feet.

He screamed as his feet began to rapidly shrink in size and the weight of his now much heavier legs crushed all of his bones. He raised his wand preparing to Dissaperate.

"Expeliamus!" Remus was standing behind George and shot the wand out of his hand.

Mr. Weasley quickly grabbed the wand before the Death Eater could recover it, holding it and his own out at his fallen body.

A loud crack suddenly tore through air and the Death Eater Disaparated as the others in the room watched in complete shock.

"Reducto?" Fred looked at George in disbelief. "You shrank his bloody feet?!"

"It was all I could think of!" George retaliated. "Anyway it worked."

Harry stared at the place where the Death Eater had just vanished. His head swam and a stabbing pain ripped through him, clawing at his insides. He fell to his knees.

"Harry!" Hermione tried to catch him, but he was too heavy for her and she crash-landed with him onto the floor.

Lupin rushed over to them. The stitches on Harry's wounds had ripped open and blood gushed out from the open flesh.

"Damnit!" Ginny cursed in fear, seeing all the blood, she raised her wand, then lowered it again, not knowing what to do.

Lupin supported Harry's head. "Harry, HARRY, stay with me!" he looked up where Mrs. Weasely was. She had come into the room seconds before and now stood beside him. "Molly hurry he's loosing too much blood!"

Mrs. Weasely dropped beside Harry, producing her wand in her right hand.

"It's only been ten hours!" Hermione said, panicked. "How can you possibly heal him?"

"Harry didn't get these wounds from being shot," Lupin told her. "We can fix the damage; he'll still be hurt, but not as severely."

Mrs. Weasely flourished her wand across Harry's side; under the eyes of Ginny, Ron, Fred and George who watched, holding their breath.

Harry felt a hotness sear his flesh. He cried out, but the burning disappeared after two minutes and he felt the blood flow backwards and the tissue and stitches close back together. The wound pulsated in pain from the trauma inflicted upon it.

Harry saw Hermione kneeling beside Lupin. She was covered in blood once again, shards of glass embedded into cuts in her face and neck, smaller shards coating her eyelashes in a fine dust. He met her gaze. "I had too." He closed his eyes against the pain.

XXXXXXX

He was suspended between the ground and the floor. The building he was in creaked all around him; the pain of his injuries intensifying with each shift of the old rotting wood.

A large brown and tan spotted python slithered on the concrete floor below him. It's tongue flicked in and out of its mouth lapping at the small droplets of blood that dripped from his mangled feet.

"You failed Motley. Nagani can taste the treachery in your blood."

The snake slithered to the source that had called its name, sliding into a pale white hand with long bony fingers.

"Master," Motley struggled to face the figure, but the suspended animation he was held in kept his head staring straight ahead. "Master I did all that you asked. It was that girl – the filthy Mudblood, she took him to that place!"

"You dare tell me that my plans were foiled by one stupid Mudblood girl?!" Voldemort's voice echoed throughout the room in complete anger. He walked in front of Motley's line-of-sight, his dark eyes and the whiteness of his skin resembling him to the ghost of a man who had died in a horribly disfiguring accident. His hand was grasped around a long, powerfully coiled wand.

"No my Lord," Motely backtracked in terror. "There were extraneous circumstances – even beyond your power to control."

"That's where you're wrong," Voldemort said, allowing Nagani to curl herself around his arms. "For you see I have planned for every circumstance, even the disgrace of your failure. How is it you think that you came to be here?" He raised his wand and a silver pistol floated out front of him; the same Sig Sauer that Motley had used to fire on Hermione. It stopped, suspended inches in front of Motley. Voldemort would not touch a Muggle weapon; but he didn't have too. "You had a powerful purpose Motley, but now that purpose is over." He swept his wand at the gun and it fired, a bullet exploded from the barrel tearing right through Motley's chest.

Motley screamed in agony, unable to even clutch at his gapping wound. Blood poured out of the hole like a hideous river.

Voldemort stared straight into Motley's screaming face, his eyes indifferent to his pain. "I will gather your replacement." Nagani slid off his arms with a noble stride, and Motley's screams tore through the house as she began to eat him alive.

XXXXXX

Here dear," Mrs. Weasely adjusted the pillows behind Harry's head. "Is that alright?"

Harry nodded to show his approval.

Mrs. Weasley spread one of the gray blankets atop the bed.

"Mum he already has two," Ron argued. "You're going to suffocate him."

Molly's infamous glare found her son causing him to duck behind the copy of the Quidditch magazine he had just picked up off his bed.

Harry was lying in Ron's spare bed. He had arrived at the Burrow just a little over an hour ago. The scene at St. Mary's had fallen into chaos. Almost the entire Metro police force in the south of London had descended upon the hospital. They had locked the facility down, but a thorough sweep had turned up no trace of the madman witnesses said had terrorized the entire seventh floor.

The memories of all the witnesses of Harry's shooting had not been completely modified. Wiping away all the collective thoughts of such a large crowd was too dangerous; the concentration of the spell could magnify and obliterate all memories of the people it was cast on. Instead Remus and Arthur had used an Obscuring Spell. The Muggle witnesses would remember the events, but vaguely without any memory of exact details such as faces and names, or that wands had been used instead of guns.

It was agreed that Harry would be taken back to the Weasely's. In the morning the Window would be lifted and it would be much easier to heal him at the Burrow then to try and explain his miraculous recovery to the doctors.

Harry could feel the pull of his wounds as he shifted in the bed to get comfortable. He was wearing one of Ron's World Cup jerseys. Mrs. Weasely had offered him some of Ron's pajama bottoms he had politely refused. His jeans were well worn enough that they were comfortable to lie in, but it was more because of the fact that Ron was several inches taller then him and his pants would trail down past Harry's feet.

"Where's Professor Lupin?" Harry asked.

"He's downstairs," Mrs. Weasely said fussing with the ends of Harry's blankets. "He wanted to stay but I convinced Nymphadora to make him go home. She hasn't seen him all day and was out of her mind with worry."

"And Hermione?"

"She's across the hall in Ginny's room. I had to practically force her to go and lie down; you've both had a rough few hours." She eyed Harry critically like he would burst it to flames at any moment.

Harry absorbed her concern. She was the only mother figure he had ever known. She had done so much for him over the years; including what she had done for him tonight. He wanted to tell her this, to say thank you, but he didn't even know where to begin a remark like that.

Mrs. Weasely ruffled his hair gently – she already knew what Harry couldn't say. "I'll be downstairs dear if you need anything." Her words were heavy laden with emotion as she kissed the top of his head.

"And you Ronald-" she towered over her Ron in the bed. "I want you in bed, no talking. Harry needs to rest." She walked over a pile of clothes at the end of the bed without missing a step and walked out the bedroom door, shutting it quietly behind her.

"Not bloody likely," Ron muttered after she left. "Sleeping is the last thing on my mind." He turned his head to Harry. "You alright Mate?" His voice was genuinely concerned. "You scared us pretty badly. I thought we'd have to give Kreacher away to someone." It was as close to admitting that he had been scared of Harry dying as Ron was going to get.

Harry managed the quietest of laughs; watching Ron yawn so hugely that his jaw popped and Harry was certain that his face was going to split open. Ron had just gotten through telling him that he wasn't tired, but the night had been exhausting for them all.

"Hermione wouldn't shut her ruddy mouth all night," Ron's head dropped onto his pillow. "You better be good to her after this. She drove us completely mental over you." His eyes closed almost immediately after he was through talking and soon the sound of his varied pitch snoring filled the small bedroom.

Harry didn't even have time to counter any of what Ron had said before he had fallen asleep. He leaned back against the pillows behind him, eyes closed, listening to the sound of Ron's snoring. Ron's tiny owl Pidwigeon hooted softly in her cage in sync with Ron's snoring.

A wooden framed window sat above Ron's bed and a spray of stars in the cloudy night sky revealed itself through it. Harry stared at the pinpoints of light that hung above the sleeping earth below. The covers on his body began to make his legs warm over his jeans and he pulled them down to the end of the bed with slow grimaced movements.

A quiet knock, so soft that it seemed like it wasn't there at all, sounded on the door.

Harry thought that Mrs. Weasely had forgotten something. But when the door opened, Hermione's outline

was there in the half-light of the kerosene lamps that hung suspended on the rafters above Ron's room. She stared into the room, hesitant to come in, as if she didn't want to wake anyone up.

Harry didn't speak, but he nodded on the end of a look.

Hermione walked towards the bed, never once knocking into the piles of books and clothing that covered the floor. She climbed silently over the edge of the bed, Harry guided her with one arm as she edged closer to him on her knees.

She stretched out against his body, carefully avoiding his injured side, her legs were pressed against his, her torso and chest against his own.

Harry conceded to her quiet weight, sliding a caressing hand across her back.

Hermione's eyes closed at his haunting gentleness; she laid her head in the hollow of his neck, breathing a breath that would have been a longing sob had she allowed it to complete itself.

Harry pressed the other hand to the top of her head, kissing the flesh above her left temple.

The stars twinkled outside in a silent sky as they lay there – listening to the breathing.

XXXXXXXXX

End.

I'm very happy with how this came out, so hopefully someone will agree with me. I apologize for any error in the spellwork, I kept referencing to the HP books to get the names right, but I'm sure I was off several times, I tried to simply describe spells that I didn't know, hopefully it came off well as a whole. Any other errors towards the world of Harry Potter was purely accidental.

I did my best to try and morph the movies and the books together, drawing on the best elements of both. I saw the films first so Dan Radcliffe is Harry in my mind – much easier on my eyes then those tiny illustrations at the beginning of each chapter, haha.

This fic contained no songs but songs that inspired it – that I listened to during the coarse of writing this – are listed below:

"O-Oh Child (redone)" Beth Orton- A sweet little lullaby-like song, reminded me so much of Harry's relationship with Mrs. Weasely.

"May It Be" Celtic Woman/Enya – every time I hear this beautiful piece I think of Harry Potter. It was written for Lord of the Rings, but it can inspire two things.

"Savin' Me." Nickleback - This set the mood for the entire piece. It depicted Harry's drive to save the people he loves no matter what the circumstances, and their drive to save him.

"Now or Never." Josh Groban – A hauntingly powerful song whose lyrics became the ending scene with Harry and Hermione.

Feedback is welcomed and greatly appreciated, flames will doused with water.

Thank you.

Peace,

Mystic.